


before something breaks (that cannot be fixed)

by Patcho418



Category: RWBY
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, yang really needs to stop hiding her pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-04
Updated: 2019-12-04
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:35:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21666772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Patcho418/pseuds/Patcho418
Summary: Yang probably doesn’t think anyone notices the faint limp she walks away from fights trying to conceal. She probably doesn’t think anyone sees the faint seeping red that fades with a shimmer of golden aura quickly enough, nor the remnants of battle dug into the skin of her knuckles and forearm. She’s very quick to hide the pain of a confrontation, sometimes with a boisterous attitude to distract others from her pain, other times by adjusting her combat gear to hide cuts and scrapes and bruises.Of course, stealth has never exactly been her strong suit.Of course Blake notices.
Relationships: Blake Belladonna/Yang Xiao Long
Comments: 18
Kudos: 326
Collections: Bmblb





	before something breaks (that cannot be fixed)

Yang probably doesn’t think anyone notices the faint limp she walks away from fights trying to conceal. She probably doesn’t think anyone sees the faint seeping red that fades with a shimmer of golden aura quickly enough, nor the remnants of battle dug into the skin of her knuckles and forearm. She’s very quick to hide the pain of a confrontation, sometimes with a boisterous attitude to distract others from her pain, other times by adjusting her combat gear to hide cuts and scrapes and bruises.

Of course, stealth has never exactly been her strong suit.

Of course Blake notices.

She especially notices when she wakes up one night and instead of hearing Yang’s trademark snores sounding from the bunk above her, she instead hears hushed whimpering and quiet hisses of pain and frustration from outside their dorm.

Initially, her reaction is subdued panic, her thoughts racing at what wound her partner could be hiding from them this time; the panic deepens in her chest when she remembers their mission into the launch site earlier that day. Yang’s aura was low but she’d insisted on performing their team attack to wrangle up a few troublesome Sabers that had found their way into the vast arctic chambers.

The attack had been successful, but it had also left Yang drained for the rest of the day and very obviously concealing vicious tears in her arm and upon her face that she quickly masked with some quick aura healing.

Blake shudders at the thought that these might be the same wounds she’s tending to right now, and that she’s the one that practically launched Yang into that pain.

Her hand rests under her cheek as she contemplates going out to see her, thinking that maybe this is a conversation they need to have. It’s not the only one; Blake knows they have a lot to talk about. That day in Argus that’s left them both equally scarred and that’s strained crimson onto their souls. The touches and stares and every blush that spreads across her cheeks when she hears the chipper warmth of Yang’s voice, and the blush that spreads across Yang’s cheeks that makes Blake fall further and faster for her.

And she worries, of course, about the callouses and cuts on Yang’s skin, and about bones snapping against the force of an attack. She thinks of gold stained by red and aura burning away like embers as she submits herself to every strike from her opponents, and about the screech of metal against metal, of ferocity against her body.

It would settle Blake’s mind and heart to know it isn’t injury from their team attack that Yang’s nursing outside their door, but she knows otherwise. More than anything, she’d love to be out there with Yang, tending to the wounds aura seeps over and fails to heal, bandaging those nasty tears in her cheeks with as much tenderness as she can manage, brush her thumbs over her knuckles where old wounds have settled.

A gnarled but muffled growl causes Blake to grimace and her ears to flick to the door, and they pay close attention to the gentle sobs that follow.

Blake takes her lower lip between her teeth in thought before sighing and sliding out of her bunk. Her arms instinctively curl against her chest—Atlas is always so cold, no matter where they are—as she silently moves towards the door. She hesitates for a moment at the handle; clearly, Yang’s on her own for a reason, and if she needs to be alone Blake wonders if intruding on that would set back whatever relationship it is that they’ve been slowly, wordlessly pursuing.

No.

Blake shuts her eyes and keeps them shut as she pushes down the thoughts that betray her heart; this isn’t like before, Yang isn’t like him. She won’t lash out, and even if she needs her alone time she’ll let Blake know. That much, Blake is sure of. Even more so, she’s sure that what her heart needs right now is to see Yang, to at least try and ease her pain as much as she can, and to let her know she doesn’t have to hide the wounds.

Her fingers curl around the doorknob and she opens the door, finding Yang seated cross-legged against the wall opposite them as she cradles a freshly-bandaged arm that Blake can only assume is wounded from the Sabers they fought earlier; her heart sinks at the thought.

Yang peers up, lilac shaking painfully for a moment before settling. At the same time, she lowers her arm into her lap where a spool of medical bandages rests, and she smiles tiredly. “Hey Blake,” she rasps.

Blake steps out of the doorframe and closes the door behind her. “You’re up late.” She tries not to draw attention to the very obvious wounds she’s no longer concealing, the t-shirt she’s wearing leaving little to be hidden.

Despite her efforts, though, Yang shrinks in on herself. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“Right,” Blake says with a nod and a frown. She takes cautious steps forward as Yang shamefully regards her bandaged arm, which she moves closer to her chest when Blake sinks to her knees in front of her. “Yang, you’re hurt.”

“It’s just a scratch,” Yang lies with a half-cocky smirk. “I’ll be fine.”

Blake shakes her head. “That’s not the point.”

Yang stills instantly, her eyes diverting their gaze from her. “Then what is the point Blake?” she speaks with a subdued hostility in her tone, one that doesn’t go unnoticed to Blake but certainly doesn’t play in her expression; instead, she looks scared, closed-off.

Blake sighs and looks at her arm. The bandages are loose, hastily wrapped around her arm, and though she might try and hide it Blake notices the very subtle shake to Yang’s hand. Part of her is desperate to reach out, take her hand in her own, soothe her with kind whispers, and part of her is held back by sentences playing in her mind that warn her of messing everything up and pushing Yang further away; by Yang’s tone, Blake’s leaning more towards the safety of those thoughts.

Still, her head remains dipped as her eyes never leave Yang’s trembling hand. “The point,” Blake begins, “is that you shouldn’t be hiding your wounds like this.”

Yang presses her lips together and she shrinks further. “You don’t have to worry about me, Blake. I’m a tough gal, I can handle it.”

“But I do worry,” is Blake’s rebuttal, a soft and desperate plea. She tries not to let her eyes trail to Yang’s right, to wear steel meets flesh, but Yang catches the quick dart of her eyes and Blake feels the space between them stretch.

“I’m fine, Blake.”

Blake shakes her head, more forceful than before, and shuffles forward, desperate to reclaim that rapidly receding space. “Yang,” she breathes, “you’re not. You don’t have to put up this façade of being okay, we’re all here for you. You’re not made of stone.”

“You guys have enough on your plate,” Yang replies.

“And you don’t think your wellbeing is one of my concerns?” Blake’s voice is harsh, harsher maybe than what she initially intended, but her point needs to be made.

There’s a quiet as Blake collects herself and Yang remains still with a shameful glint in her eyes. Blake’s not sure when she reached out and took Yang’s shaking hand in her own, but her grip loosens as her breathing steadies; before she can pull her fingers away, however, Yang laces hers between them, and Blake is surprised by the strength with which she holds onto her.

Her heart slams into her chest, her adrenaline and desperation mixing with the breathlessness she always feels when her skin meets Yang’s. The pads of her fingers rest gently on her knuckles, and her assumptions are right: she feels the calloused skin under them, bumpy and stiff and flecked with tiny wounds no one else would even know were there unless they sought them out.

Blake’s fingers skate back and forth along Yang’s and she lets go a breath she didn’t realise she’s been holding. “Please, Yang,” she implores, yearning for that glow of yellow to coat her again, “don’t do this to yourself. I can’t—I can’t stand to see you in pain, and I can’t stand the thought of losing you.” Then, in a smaller voice that cracks from her throat: “You mean too much to me.”

Yang’s eyes don’t lift from her arm, but Blake can feel her breath steadying, too. Her fingers go limp in Blake’s hold and her head slouches before a weary breath exits her mouth. “I don’t want to lose you, either.”

There’s an understanding, and it floats silent between them. To Blake, it’s loneliness under a sun she wishes had been a different light, and while she doesn’t know quite what it is to Yang, she knows of mournful nights under a still moon and in an empty bed. And there’s now, with teal and white and the glow of the northern lights shining down on them together, and loneliness is the last thing either of them wants to feel ever again.

“I’m sorry about today. I might have thrown you a bit too hard at those Grimm.” She removes her fingers from in between Yang’s and reaches for her forearm, just above where the bandages end and she can still make out the lacerations on her skin. She picks up the spool of bandage from between them and gets to work covering the wound.

Yang shakes her head. “No, I should be the one apologizing. It was my idea to do Bumblebee with such low aura.” Finally, her eyes lift from her arm and Blake sees the small flecks of battle scarring the bags of her tired eyes; despite that, she can’t help but lose herself in Yang’s gaze. She extends her arm, allowing Blake to reach under her elbow and wrap the bandage around her wound. “I’ll be more careful next time.”

Blake smiles gently as she finishes tending to Yang’s wound, resting her palm against the bend of her arm; it’s no surprise to her how Yang leans into her touch, and she indulges her a bit by rubbing her hand along her arm. “We’ll both be more careful. We’re in this together, Yang.”

“Thanks,” Yang relinquishes as she inspects her arm. Blake watches with admiration as her work is taken in, Yang quickly glancing between her arm and Blake as a smile spreads across her lips. Then, to Blake’s surprise, she reaches forward, and her signature smirk paints her features. “Kiss it better?”

Blake rolls her eyes and scoffs, but that doesn’t stop her from indulging Yang just a bit more. She leans forward and brings her lips to her wrist in a chaste kiss that she wishes she could linger on for a moment longer, but of course she’s still not exactly sure where her and Yang stand.

As she pulls away, though, the gentle way Yang regards her confirms that maybe it’s exactly where she wants to be with her right now.

**Author's Note:**

> Based off of a tumblr post by [kusnilive](https://kusnilive.tumblr.com/post/189419388268/was-thinking-about-bees-combo-they-have-where).
> 
> Thanks everyone for reading! As always, I'm very open to criticism and feedback, as well as suggestions for writing prompts! You can find me on Tumblr, [PatchoDraws](https://patchodraws.tumblr.com/):!


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